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"Ah," said I. And I thought of the bottle of prussic acid with mingled sentiments. All through these many months I had Judith dwelling, a pale ghost, in the back of my mind. We had parted so finally that correspondence between us had seemed impertinent. But although I had not written to her, no small part of the infinite sadness that had fallen upon my life was the shadow of her destiny.
There was no label on it, but it needed none the strong, penetrating odor of bitter almonds was telltale evidence enough. It was prussic, or hydrocyanic acid, probably the most deadly poison and the swiftest in its action that was known to science Carling had provided against that "some day" in his confession!
Some relief was obtained by mesmerism, a remedy suggested by Medwin; but the obstinacy of the torment preyed upon his spirits to such an extent, that even during the last months of his life we find him begging Trelawny to procure him prussic acid as a final and effectual remedy for all the ills that flesh is heir to.
Give a mixture of syrup of poppies and prussic acid morning and night, and the ball as yesterday. 31st. Nearly in the same state as yesterday, except that he is not so thirsty, and does not eat so well. Give the mixture three times daily. Nov. 1st. He had an emetic in the morning, which produced a large quantity of phlegm, but the cough is no better. No evacuation during the two last days.
The odor of his person is vile, his blood is poisoned, his intellect is dulled. A smoker is never a healthy man, either in body or mind, for nicotine is a poison. Prussic acid is the only poison that is worse. Nicotine poisons the blood, dulls the brain, and is the cause of disease.
Such post mortem not having been made, the case, after Professor Aiken's analysis, would have been dropped, because it was impossible that prussic acid could have caused the death. Had, however, capable experts failed to detect a natural cause of death, a very serious case might have been made out against Dr. Schoeppe, even though the analyst had not found morphia in the stomach.
Finally I decided on prussic acid; its after effects are unpleasant but its action is swift and certain. What did it matter to me if I turned black and smelt of almonds when I was dead? Taking the phial from the chest I poured an ample but not an over dose of the poison into a medicine glass, mixing it with a little water, so that it might be easier to swallow.
He has fallen down and worshipped that miserable 'Ich' of his, and made that, and not God's will, the centre and root of his philosophy, his poetry, and his self-idolizing aesthetics; and when it fails him, then for prussic acid, and nonentity. Those old Romans, too why, they are the very experimentum crucis of suicide!
And if a poison is in common use, we must embrace all the results of such use in a perfect generalization before we can decide impartially. We do not hesitate to eat peaches, though we know they owe much of their peculiar flavor to prussic acid. It is but fair to apply an equally large generalization to tobacco.
INDUCTIVE REASONING. When one carefully investigates his reasons for believing as he does, he often finds that he accepts a certain statement as true because he is familiar with many specific instances that tend to establish its truth. The belief that prussic acid is poisonous is based upon the large number of instances in which its deadly effect has been apparent.
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